Maybe not in 2010

For many months, we have believed that we will serve our country best by helping elect Mar as president of our Republic. We still hold that belief because we did not embrace it without ample evidence of Mar’s great capacity to lead our people. We know that Mar has the heart, mind and disposition to become the president our country never had thus far.

We still believe Mar is our country’s best chance for a great president, but maybe not in 2010.

I had wished that Mar decided differently. However, I am beginning to realize, through the pain and disappointment, that in fact Mar’s decision is simply consistent with what we know of and admire in him. First, he took the pro-active responsibility of directly grappling with the issue of another potential presidential candidate within the Liberal Party. Second, he decided to act, not as the LP candidate for president, but as president of the LP. Third, he decided to give way at the cost of his own candidacy to someone he is convinced is the best candidate at this time of our nation’s life. This is the kind of self-less and visionary leadership we have always believed were the stuff that made us all Mar-tians. No good deed is ever wasted and Mar had done a good deed for our nation.

Tita Cory had a gift. She was able to move many to act according to their best lights, to rise above their habits and limitations, and to embrace the higher calling of serving the country, particularly at moments of national crises. This gift gave us the snap elections in 1986 and the people power revolution that it spawned. Amazingly, Tita Cory’s death last August 1 became another showering of this gift to move people to rise above indifference, cynicism and confusion and once more embrace engagement, hope and clarity. Tita Cory’s passing awakened the dream of servant leadership within Noynoy. And Tita Cory’s passing made Mar an even bigger person than he is by giving up his own dream of a Mar presidency for a much greater dream of restoring the virtues of Tita Cory’s good governance to our country ravaged by GMA’s 9 years of abuse and corruption. Tita Cory’s gift keeps on giving as hundreds, thousands and eventually millions of our fellow Filipinos, including ourselves the believers and followers of Mar, rise and restore the blessings of good government to a country that hungers and thirsts for it.

We can now begin to see the big picture that Mar saw last week. Noynoy has the potential to galvanize the many different circles that Mar’s campaign had been laboring to lead. Noynoy can reach the broad, true and committed anti-GMA opposition, defined by their principled resistance to GMA’s bad governance rather than their partisan disaffection with being shut out from patronage of that bad government. Noynoy has also the potential to move many dedicated reform communities that have not yet recognized how crucial 2010 will be to their important causes and advocacies. And most important of all, Noynoy can galvanize the large segments of our country that long for the virtues of Tita Cory in our government, the enduring virtues of integrity, sacrifice, simplicity, and sincere dedication to faithful public service. These are virtues that Mar upheld, but in this time and place, given Tita Cory’s recent passing, these virtues may be more easily recognized and affirmed by our people in a Noynoy presidency.

We are all deeply disappointed that this belief in the goodness of a Mar presidency, which we have held for many months, we will now have to hold on for many more years before its eventual realization. But we are also heartened by the recognition that our trust in Mar was not misplaced, and we derive much satisfaction in sharing with Mar this sacrifice of setting aside our common dream for the sake of a larger dream for the nation we all love and seek to serve.

For many months I had this dream of 6 years of Mar’s presidency leading a resurgent Philippines. I am not giving up that dream but I am trading up to 12 years of a resurgent Philippines, first under another Aquino presidency, and then under another Roxas presidency. The best dreams always take much longer to realize.